A War For Peace
by Robinton
Summary: Harry always knew that he would be forced to defeat Voldemort, but it had never seemed so real. As the battle looms closer, Harry just tries to hold his life together, so that when the final battle is over, he will not only live, but will have a reason to


_Responsibility_

Harry stretched out upon his bed, gazing absentmindedly out the window at the patterns of shadows cast across his window by the old maple tree out in the yard. Not that it was really that old of a tree, Harry pondered. It certainly hadn't resided on privet drive for long, but the muggles had decided that they wanted a tree, so they bought one, fully grown and thrust it into the ground and pretended that it had always been there.

That's the problem with people today, so impatient, Harry thought wryly. He looked around his room, trying not to stir from his mildly comatose state of boredom induced vegetation. After all, the time does pass much more quickly when you are not aware of what goes on around you, and he wanted time to pass with a speed that far outshone anything he had felt before, as in eighteen minutes, his two weeks in hell with the Dursleys would be up, and he could leave and never come back.

The clock continued to tick as he looked and came to a sudden realization that made him jump up in a panic. In eighteen minutes, he would no longer be protected. In eighteen minutes, he would just be a lone boy, no matter how talented, in the middle of an unforgiving world without protection and in just a few minutes, he would be vulnerable, and Voldemort would know, and would come. Harry had no idea how he hadn't seen it before. Voldemort was sure to attack the moment that the magical protection upon the house ran out.

Harry heard a loud crack outside of his window. That must be Voldemort, or one of his Death Eaters, moving into position before the big attack. Harry grabbed his wand, ready for the inevitable battle came. He let Hedwig out of her cage and sent her out of his bedroom window, allowing her to glide through the night to safety, wherever she could find it.

"Harry Potter!" yelled a voice outside of his window. "OY, HARRY." That certainly didn't sound like a Death Eater.

"Bill?" asked Harry. "Is that you?"

"More or less; mind if I come up?"

"No, not at all," replied Harry.

Bill pulled a wand out of his coat pocket and, with a simple flick and swish, conjured a staircase that allowed him to climb up to Harry's window. He jogged up it quickly and jumped through the window, into the darkened room. "Bill, seriously, we need to get out of here, Voldemort is—"

"Why do you think that I am here?"

"Oh," replied Harry.

"We're going to the burrow. And we need to set a sort of diversion."

"So what are we going to do?"

"Well, lets just sat that you're probably going to like it. Do you have your stuff packed?"

"Yeah, its all over there," said Harry, pointing to a trunk standing at the end of the bed.

"Brilliant," said Bill. He flicked his wand and it vanished. "Anything else?"

"Nope."

"Okay, we need to do this quickly," muttered Bill as he pulled out his wand. With one last flick the bad burst into flames. The joy on Harry's face was almost indescribable. Bill then pulled out two, small drawstring bags, handing one to Harry. "You know what to do, don't you?" he asked.

Harry opened up the bag to find it filled with bright, sparkling powder, floo powder. Bill threw a small scrap of paper from his own bag into the fire, and it surged higher. "Quick," said Bill. "It's connected to the floo network now, but only for a few minutes. Harry threw a small measure of floo powder onto the mounting flames, turning them bright green. Both men stepped into the fire, and called out "The Burrow" and they were gone.

They appeared again on the warm hearth of the burrow, where Mrs. Weasley was waiting impatiently. "Where have you been?" she called out. "I was going spare. Do you realize all of the things that could have gone wrong? You could have been captured. You," she said, pointing to Bill, "were almost too late. What if you hadn't gotten there in time. As it is, the muggles are going to have a hard time getting out of there before You Know Who comes. I can't believe how dangerous this all was. Thank you, though, you know that this means a lot to me, getting Harry to safety."

"You're welcome mum," said Bill, grinning. It was always this way with Mrs. Weasley. There would be a tirade no matter what you did, so you might as well just let the storm blow over.

Mrs. Weasley then enveloped Harry in a big hug, shaking him back and forth before she let go. She eyed him over with her shrewd glance, and then finally determined that he needed food, before rushing into the kitchen to fetch some, without even consulting Harry. Harry supposed, though, that it times of war, especially times as dangerous as these, it was nice that at least a few things remained constant.

A small buzzer went off, and Harry felt a small warmth against his leg. Mrs. Weasley went over to the table and turned off the buzzer, before bringing Harry a plate loaded over with eggs, toast, roast beef, potatoes, and green beans. "I didn't know whether you wanted dinner or breakfast, so I just brought them both over, Harry dear."

"Thank you," said Harry in delight, smiling over his food.

"Well," said Bill, "Let's see it."

"What?"

"Your wand, of course. What did you think that buzzer was for? Mom set it so that she would know the moment that you were seventeen. Well, I think that it was actually there so that she could fillet me alive if I wasn't home with you before it rang, but meh, what's the difference. "

Harry pulled out his wand to see it glowing a bright yellow. He flicked it quickly and a shimmering message spilled from the end.

_Congratulations HARRY POTTER, you are now a legal adult and responsible for all of your actions. You will be prosecuted as such in the future. Watch your step._

"What?" cried Harry.

"Don't worry," said Bill, "it does that for everyone. Dad always said that it was originally a joke done by some bloke interning for the minister. However, it caught on so no one wanted to remove it."

"Okay," said Harry, still slightly puzzled.

"Bill, where is everyone anyway?"

"Well, I know that Fred and George are at their shop. They tend to sleep there a lot, something about getting up early in the mornings during summer, and, how do they put it, "harvesting the money grown by the parents of our nation's youth." And I know that Dad is off at the ministry. He went in a little late today, so I'm not exactly surprised that he hasn't come home yet. They have him doing a lot of raids at night, trying to find warehouses full of fake charms and the like. He got another promotion by the way. He is now director of the department for the control of maliciously magical items. It's really great, except I pity the poor bloke that vacated the spot."

"Really?" asked Harry, "What happened?"

"He tried to confiscate a shipment of what he believed to be cursed Dungbombs. The only problem was that someone got mad at him and sent a stunner at him. He dodged it, but it hit the Dungbombs, and they all went off. It turned out that they were more or less normal Dungbombs, but being trapped in a warehouse like that, filled with the fumes, he started to suffocate, eventually went into a bit of a coma. They woke him up, but he wasn't quite the same. A little funny if you know what I mean. He never went back to work after that, just spends his days at home, with an air freshener tied around his neck."

They both laughed for a while before Bill continued. "I'm pretty sure that Charlie is back in Romania right now. He had some work to do for the order, trying to recruit some organization to come and work for us. Percy is at an international summit, actually. He's trying to get Voldemort recognized as a threat to international wizarding security. Most nations see it that way, but few are willing to play an active role and many simply don't care what goes on in Britain, as they don't think that it can affect them."

"Ron is off in the village. He and Hermione decided to go to dinner."

Harry raised his eyebrows in surprise at that comment. "They figured it out?"

"Surprisingly no," chuckled Bill, "They're just down there as friends, but I've got even odds with the twins that they'll figure everything out this week. I hope that they do. I need the Galleons, veela are expensive. Fun, but expensive. As for Fleur, she's in Paris with her sister, something about female bonding. Shopping, I can only assume. Well, if you don't mind I'm going to go to bed, I'm bloody tired."

The door opened and Harry and Hermione walked rather haphazardly into the room. Upon seeing Harry, Hermione gave out a small squeal and gave him a hug. Laughing, Ron jogged over to him and patted him on the back.

"No problems getting here?" asked Ron.

"Nope," said Harry.

"Seventeen?"

"Yep."

"Wicked," grinned Ron.

"How have you been?" asked Harry.

"Pretty good today, but bloody bored before that. Hermione only arrived earlier this evening. Bill has been off who knows where in the mornings, and can barely stay awake at night. Everyone else has been gone. And Gin—"

"Ronald," snapped Hermione.

"Right," muttered Ron. "But, anyway, things have to pick up now that you're here, right?"

"Ron," said Harry seriously, "How is Ginny?"

"Pretty good," said Ron.

"Really?" asked Harry.

"She's fine Harry," said Hermione soothingly. "Or at least she will be. She cries a lot, but…it will pass. Don't worry."

"Oh," said Harry softly.

"It's okay mate," said Ron, putting his arm around Harry's shoulders. "It's not your fault, really."

"Yeah," said Harry quietly, "it is."


End file.
